Vint Cerf explains why the Internet needs IPv6

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The Internet has run out of IP address space and one of the founding fathers of the Internet is here to explain why, and what is being done about it.

Vint Cerf is now Chief Internet Evangelist at Google, but he used to work for DARPA and helped fund the groups that created TCP/IP. He later moved to MCI and helped create the first commercial email system, and was also a key person in the creation of ICANN. Now in his late 60s, Cerf is the best man to talk to about the Internet and the transition it is being forced to go through.

The Internet was designed back in 1973, but didn’t come online until 1983. It was just an experiment, so they decided 4.3 billion termination points (IPv4) would be more than the system would ever need. With billions of devices now in use, they were quite mistaken.

The new format for Internet packets, known as IPv6, was designed in 1996. It solves the issue of running out of IP address space due to the fact it offers up 340 trillion trillion trillion addresses (340,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000). We may run out again in the future, but under IPv6 the Internet is near infinite, so no one has to worry about it in the near or even far distant future..

Today is the day that IPv6 gets turned on (World IPv6 Launch Day) and the transition to the larger address space really begins. It will take some time because it requires the so-called “plumbing” of the Internet to be updated. The good news for end users is it’s up to the equipment providers and companies/services that run the Internet to perform this update leaving us free to keep on enjoying it.